THeBigissue25OcT–7NOV2013 23
of market culture the new imperium is the idea
that people who are wealthy are wealthy because
of acts of will, and people are poor because of acts
of will or failures of character. There’s never any
circumstantial argument for being poor in the
new dispensation, and the only form of political
correctness that the Right will ever pander to, or
even entertain, is the notion that there is no class.
Because if you mention class then that basically
means that the people who are rich are lucky, and
the people who are poor are unlucky and they have
robbed them of their will and you are pandering to
the politics of envy.
“In a sense, I think it’s toxic – it’s stripping
people of humanity and imagination to think that
Australia’s prosperity is a result of good management
rather than good fortune. Particularly in WA, from
reading people’s profiles and their public utterances
you would think they invented iron ore – that they
planted the seed and they watered it and now they
are harvesting the fruits of their hard labour.”
There are glimpses in Eyrie of affluent WA: the
mansions, receptions and sundrenched beaches.
But Keely is also exposed to a frightening underside.
When it is suggested that it is not a very affectionate
view of Fremantle, Winton responds: “Well it is.
But, as in anything, you are hardest on the things
you love the most.” It is, he concludes, a view of
Fremantle and Australia on the cusp of the GFC –
“an interesting time to write about a bloke and his
situation, hurling himself against the current”.
Suddenly he’s back in the present. “We just went
through a federal election where the people on
welfare and the working poor were absent from the
debate,” he says. “Part of the frustration behind the
book was watching those people hurl themselves
against the great walls of indifference in politics and
in the media.”
» Eyrie is out now.
alfresco for a sandwich and an industrial brew.
Invalid pensioners, denizens of the dosshouses,
park sleepers, wharf rats, outpatients of the failing
mental health service. At this rate he’d be joining
their number soon enough...”
Eyrie charts Keely’s reluctant withdrawal from
self-destructive isolation after losing his job and
sense of self. A key milestone on his road back is
when he starts to see other tower-dwellers in a
different light: “That was the Mirador for you. Ten
floors of architectural uniformity. And within it, all
those folks resisting replication. The thought gave
him a stab of fondness, for people, for shambling,
ordinary folks...”
Winton has always written about ordinary
people. And when Keely reluctantly starts to help
Gemma, a childhood friend, and her young son, Kai,
he gradually rediscovers a sense of purpose – as
do vendors when they start selling The Big Issue.
Winton writes: “The idea [of making Kai feel safe]
was intoxicating. It made a man feel enormous and
substantial. That he might be necessary.”
Behind his narrative there is also the bigger
picture: contemporary Australia. Winton says:
“It is a prosperous country and a rich culture, but
we are remarkably incurious about those that get
left behind in prosperity’s wake. As Keely discovers,
the working class of his childhood has gone, in the
same way that any expatriate has to cope with the
fact that the country they left behind is a foreign
place that has gone on without them... So he thinks
he speaks fluent working class but of course he
doesn’t – there is no working class, there is the
wealthier class and there is the working poor.”
He continues: “It is the working poor who
undergird all the prosperous middle class. For every
mobile wealthy couple...who’s looking after their
ancient mum and dad, who are the shadows in the
halls of the five-star hotels, who’s in the hospitality
industry, who’s washing the dishes?”
In the book, and also in the community, there is a
fine and fragile line between doing okay and things
going wrong. “This is where we find ourselves,”
Winton says. “It’s interesting that with the success